Man arrested following fatal personal watercraft crash on the Merrimack; body found

CHELMSFORD - A 32-year-old Lowell man charged with drunken boating is being held on $7,500 bail following a fatal accident on the Merrimack River late Sunday during which a teenager fell from one of the personal watercrafts and it took public safety personnel hours to find her body late Monday morning.

Douglas Dematos was also charged with negligent operation of a motor boat, operating a jet ski at night, operating an unregistered motorboat, operating at night without navigation lights, operating a jet ski too close to another vessel.

He was arraigned in his Lowell General Hospital bed Monday afternoon in front of Lowell District Court Judge Stacey Fortes. The prosecuting attorney is Ashlee Mastrangelo.

During the arraignment, several law enforcement personnel were in the room.

At about 10:34 p.m., Sunday, officers were dispatched to the Merrimack River for a report of people yelling and arguing. Upon arrival, officers conducted a preliminary investigation and learned that two jet skis had collided on the river, resulting in a female passenger on one of the jet skis being knocked into the water.

Upon further investigation, officers determined that Dematos had been operating one of the jet skis and had allegedly been drinking alcohol prior to the collision. Dematos was transported to Lowell General Hospital as a result of his injuries, which are not believed to be life threatening.

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Public safety officials would not say definitively the body was that of the missing teen, but it's generally believed it the body of the girl missing since the crash. Law enforcement did not say where the body was found. The victim's identity was not yet released, pending a determination from the medical examiner.

Preliminary investigation indicates the victim was the passenger on a personal watercraft piloted by a friend of hers near the Wotton Street boat ramp in Chelmsford when it collided with another personal watercraft some time after 10 p.

m. Sunday.

Personal watercraft are not permitted for use after sundown, and those involved Sunday night did not have any navigational lights, Middlesex District Attorney Marian Ryan said.

"This is not a waterway that is meant to be used in the evening," Ryan said.

"This equipment cannot be operated when your brain is in an impaired state," Chelmsford Police Chief James Spinney said at the press conference.

Due to the location of the incident, the Massachusetts Environmental Police assumed jurisdiction of the investigation and subsequently determined that Dematos was allegedly under the influence of alcohol.

Dematos remains in the custody of the Chelmsford Police and will be turned over to the Environmental Police following his release from the hospital. He will then be arraigned at Lowell District Court.

Boats returned as day broke Monday morning, and by 8:30 a.m., at least four searched both shores for the teenager.

Friends and relatives of the missing teenager gathered along the boat ramp Sunday night and Monday morning awaiting updates. When the hunt was called off for the night, one distraught man wept as loved ones embraced him before departing the scene.

"They are having a very hard time with this," Ryan said. "They want closure. They're not going to give up on her."

It's the second fatal crash involving personal watercraft on the Merrimack River this summer. In early July, Juan Arroyo-Ortiz of Lawrence was killed when two of the watercraft collided in waters off Lowell. That case remains under investigation.

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